The personal website of Christopher Cornell, writer of fiction

Lend me your ears

I’ve never been all that much of an Audiobook type person, but a recent blowout sale convinced me to pick up several classics just for fun. It’s interesting how a spoken performance can cast a whole new light on a familiar work. The most extreme example thus far has been the audiobook of Brave New World. Michael York utilizes hammy, over-the-top British stereotypes to voice all the actors: stuffy aristocrats for Conditioning Centre academics, working-class brogues for the Savage and other worker drones. The result transforms the work from a chilling dystopia to a virtual Monty Python skit. Judging by user reviews reactions are mixed, but it works for me as a reinforcement of the satire in ways I hadn’t considered. Interesting.

On a side note: does any business have a pricing model as goofy and byzantine as Audible? Honestly don’t get it at all. I’m not sure what’s more strange: that everything costs exactly 1 “credit” per month, or that you switch between credits and cash payments as you buy more. (A one-hour chapter of John Scalzi’s Human Division? 99 cents OR 1 credit. The 49-hour extravaganza that is George R.R. Martin’s A Dance with Dragons? 49 dollars OR 1 credit.) Are they trying to discourage users from purchasing more than one book a month? Buh?